Environmental sustainability Flashcards
1
Q
Define Command and Control (CAC)
A
- The direct regulation of an industry or activity through laws
2
Q
Explain Conservation
A
- Creative continuity of the environment,
- While ensuring that environmental change considers the quality of life for present and future generations
3
Q
Explain Environmental sustainability
A
- The ability of the environment to survive its use for economic activity.
- It refers to meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the needs of future generations
4
Q
Define Pollution
A
- Emissions which flow into the natural environment from human activity, and
- Are beyond the capacity of the environment to absorb
5
Q
Define Preservation
A
- To keep resources that are non-renewable intact
- e.g. ecological systems, heritage sites
6
Q
What is The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED)?
A
- Known as the Earth Summit. (1992)
The goal of UNCED was:
- to create strategies to stop and reverse the effects of environmental degradation
- to upport international efforts to promote sustainable development in all countries
7
Q
Factors of the state of the environment
A
- Pollution
- Conservation
- Preservation
- Externalities
8
Q
Explain, in detail, pollution
A
- Pollution relates to poisons that damage the natural environment.
- Pollution can come from chemical substances released by factories, as well as from household and business waste and rubbish.
- Pollution policy is difficult to apply in practice.
- The following are 3 ways of dealing with pollution:
- Technology and control:
- New technology is cleaner and has less impact on the environment.
- The government controls pollution by limiting the use of older technologies that pollute the environment.
- Marginal decisions:
- These are decisions made by government on what acceptable levels of pollution are.
- If the government is too tolerant, or makes its decisions in the interest of expanding business rather than sustaining the environment, then pollution levels can rise to the point where they damage the environment.
- Self-interest:
- For example, keeping a beach litter-free. People use dustbins on the beach because they want to use a beach that is clean.
9
Q
Discuss, in detail, conservation
A
- Conservation relates to the preservation of natural resources to ensure they are not completely used up and disappear from the environment.
- Conservation is necessary due to pollution and the over- utilisation of resources:
- The conservation of resources:
- Conservation is needed when resources are used more than they can reproduce to replace what has been used.
- This leads to a search for substitutes.
- Conservation policies help to conserve renewable stocks (e.g. trees) and non-renewable stocks (e.g. fossil fuels).
- Maintaining renewable stocks:
- A market economy has an interest in conservation as it helps maintain renewable stocks,
- e.g. timber and fishing.
- Conservation is achieved through the force of demand and supply which helps to sustain these kinds of industries.
- Direct controls:
- The government maintains the stock levels of environmental resources through the issuing of permits and quotas.
- For example, the government sets quotas for fishing to stop catches being so large that they exceed (are bigger than) the growth of the fish population.
- It also sets quotas for cutting down trees to ensure deforestation does not exceed the rate of renewal.
10
Q
Describe, in detail, Preservation
A
- Preservation is linked to conservation.
- It is about preserving existing assets to ensure they do not get used in a way that is destructive to the environment.
- Private property: A game reserve may be sold to a businessman to be used for farming.
- But the government can intervene and stop the sale because they recognise the importance to the environment of preserving game reserves.
- Preservation requires compromise:
- Farmers may develop their river mouth as a holiday resort.
- If this is not controlled, and too many other farmers do the same, the entire ecosystem will be damaged, and animal and plant life will be negatively affected.
- Government policy:
- Government intervenes to preserve environmental assets by:
- Buying, confiscating, taking ownership of or
nationalising resources, - e.g. indigenous forests.
- Subsidising key resources,
- e.g. privately owned ecosystems.
11
Q
Explain Externalities in regards to factors of the environment
A
- Externalities imply costs and benefits that were not planned for.
- The extra costs and benefits of externalities are not factors when the state of the environment is assessed.
- Goods that have negative externalities such as air and water pollution are generally oversupplied in the market.
- When businesses are expected to bear the cost of equipment to reduce pollution, it could have a positive externality on others.
- Businesses tend to spend little on pollution equipment due to its limited direct benefit.
- The major role of government, regarding the environment, is to correct inefficiencies arising from externalities.
12
Q
Measures to ensure sustainability
A
M – Market
I – Intervention
C – Control
M – Measures
A – Agreements
13
Q
Discuss, in detail, the market in regard to measures to ensure sustainability
A
- The market is driven by self-interest.
- The market considers the environment as an asset to be used for its own benefit.
- Sustainability is achieved in the free market only to the extent that resource prices rise as they become scarce (less available), and through the development of environment- friendly technology.
- There is a social interest in using the environment, not only to the direct producer/consumer, but also to people in general, now and in the future.
- This means we all have an interest in preserving the environment.
- Reasons why the market fails to ensure sustainability:
- The market sees the environment as a common resource.
- Externalities such as air pollution caused by factories cannot be stopped without restrictive policies.
- Lack of knowledge: Businesses cause damage without realising it,
- e.g. companies making aerosol cans (such as spray-on deodorants) and did not know the damaging effect they had on the ozone layer.
- Carelessness: People continue with harmful practices and leave future generations to worry about the consequences.
- Market mechanisms have failed when market forces fail to produce the desired result of environmental sustainability.
- All costs and benefits are not captured in the market price. The future cost of the resource disappearing is not often considered.
14
Q
Discuss, in detail, Public sector intervention in measures to ensure sustainability
A
- Public sector intervention aims to achieve social efficiency. This occurs through:
- Granting property rights:
- The conservationist effect: People care for things that belong to them.
- To prevent fauna and flora species from becoming extinct, people are granted property rights if they agree to preserve the flora and fauna.
- Property rights can be expanded to common goods such as clean air.
- The Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement whereby developed countries pay developing countries for their right to pollute.
- Charging for the use of the environment:
- Price the environment: The government levies fees for waste produced and dumped in the environment.
- In South Africa, local authorities levy charges on rubbish collection and sewage disposal.
- The best results are achieved when charges are proportional (related to) to waste produced.
- Environmental taxes:
- Environmental taxes are taxes imposed on the output of goods that generate external environmental costs (pollution). These are called green taxes.
- Carbon dioxide emissions from wineries and vehicle tyres are taxed. The tax rate is equal to the marginal external cost.
Environmental subsidies: - Subsidies are granted to businesses to reduce environmental damage, e.g. the government subsidises new technology that saves energy, such as energy-saving light bulbs or solar geysers.
- Marketable permits:
- The government gives each business a licence to pollute to a certain degree.
- Businesses sell their licences to other businesses.
- In South Africa, marketable permits are granted by the Department of Minerals and Energy.
15
Q
Explain, in detail, Public sector control in regards to measures to ensure sustainability
A
- When government environmental policies don’t produce positive results, the government takes direct control through Command and Control (CAC) systems:
- Command and Control (CAC):
- The government enforces policy by setting maximum levels of the emission of pollution.
- Most developed countries have regulations that control air and water
pollution. - There are 3 approaches in CAC systems:
- Quantity standards:
- These focus on the amount of pollution emitted.
- Quality standards:
- These focus on the environmental impact of the pollution emitted.
- Social impact standards: These focus on the effect on people of the pollution emitted.
- Voluntary agreements:
- The government concludes agreements with businesses on a voluntary basis to cut pollution.
- Education:
- Education is used to try to change people’s attitudes towards the environment.
- Innovative approaches have been tried in the developing world to educate people, e.g. setting up community wildlife reserves.
